Tom King’s CRM Plus --
Ruminations on "cultural resource management," environmental impact assessment, and related esoteric topics, by a curmudgeon who seldom has anything good to say about anything.

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Friday, May 31, 2013

Address Change, and Pity for the Postal Service

First an announcement: my snail mail address has changed. If you have me on a list, strike PO Box 14515, Silver Spring MD 20911, and replace it with my home office address: 410 Windsor Street, Silver Spring MD 20910.

The reason for this change is that the US Postal Service is (today) closing my convenient local post office, and if I want a box it's going to be a 2-mile walk away, rather than a 1-mile walk along my usual route of march to and from the Washington Metro; it's not worth it.

Several people to whom I've sent this notice have emailed me to sympathize and excoriate the Postal Service. I disagree. Sure, it's inconvenient for me not to have a handy PO box, but on the other hand, I now have the convenience of doing almost all my correspondence, bill-paying, and invoicing on-line, and the fact that millions of us are doing so is among the factors that makes it cost-ineffective to keep so many post offices open. I feel a good deal of sympathy for the Postal Service, but I fear that it -- like typewriters and stick-shifts and cuneiform tablets -- has simply had its day and will become history.

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Welcome to Tom King's CRM Plus

Welcome to my blog on topics related to "cultural resource management," whatever that may mean to you or me. I hope you find some interest in what you read here, that you'll add your own contributions, and that you'll encourage others to have a look. Thanks!

About Me

Thomas F. King holds a PhD in anthropology from the University of California Riverside (1976), and has worked since the 1960s in the evolving fields of research and management variously referred to as heritage, cultural resource management, and historic preservation. He is particularly known for his work with Section 106 of the U.S. National Historic Preservation Act, and with indigenous and other traditional cultural places.

King is the author and editor of ten textbooks and tradebooks (See http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-F.-King/e/B001IU2RWK/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1353864454&sr=1-2-ent) as well as scores of journal articles, popular articles, and internet offerings on heritage topics.His career includes the conduct of archaeological research in California and the Micronesian islands, management of academy-based and private cultural resource consulting organizations, helping establish government historic preservation systems in the freely associated states of Micronesia, oversight of U.S. government project review for the federal government’s Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, service as a litigant and expert witness in heritage-related lawsuits, and extensive work as a consultant and educator in heritage-related topics. He is the co-author of the U.S. National Park Service's government-wide guidance on "traditional cultural properties" (TCPs; see http://www.nps.gov/nr/publications/bulletins/pdfs/nrb38.pdf). He occasionally teaches short classes about historic preservation project review, traditional cultural places, and consultation with indigenous groups, and consults and writes as TFKing PhD LLC. Current major clients include several American Indian tribes and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.